This is the UK400 Club Rare Bird Alert highlighting all records of avian interest and published in association with Rare Bird Alert Pagers and utilising additional information gleaned from the Regional Birdlines, BirdGuides, local email groups and individual observers

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Friday, 31 December 2010

Year comes to a close

A total of 435 species was recorded in Britain and Ireland during 2010 - making it the second highest annual total of all time. I managed to see 358 of these - equivalent to 82% - but in terms of 'new birds' for high-ranking listers, these were few and far between - just one in many cases (the ship-assisted Indian House Crow in County Cork).

For those 1,000 members listed with 400 species or more, the year's additions included a THAYER'S GULL in Ireland in the early part of the year and a male LESSER KESTREL at Minsmere RSPB (Suffolk) in early spring. Otherwise, the highlights in spring were a first-summer male MARMORA'S WARBLER in South Wales and a long-staying ORIENTAL PRATINCOLE in Lincolnshire.

A long-awaited twitchable SYKES'S BOOTED WARBLER kick-started the autumn at Druridge Bay CP, Northumberland, in mid-August, with the afore-mentioned INDIAN HOUSE CROW appearing in September.

On the mainland, the best September offerings were an ALDER FLYCATCHER on Blakeney Point (Norfolk), an EASTERN OLIVACEOUS WARBLER at Flamborough Head (East Yorks) and an ASIATIC BROWN FLYCATCHER at Bempton (East Yorks) whilst the Isles of Scilly highlighted with BLACK-EARED WHEATEAR and EASTERN YELLOW WAGTAIL and the various Northern Isles produced yet more HORNEMANN'S ARCTIC REDPOLLS, a twitchable LANCEOLATED WARBLER, several PALLAS'S GRASSHOPPER WARBLERS, two SYKES'S BOOTED WARBLERS and a SWAINSON'S THRUSH. There were also a SOLITARY SANDPIPER at Seaton (South Devon) and twitchable OLIVE-BACKED PIPIT and WESTERN BONELLI'S WARBLERS in North Norfolk.

In the later autumn, the first twitchable AMERICAN BITTERN for 19 years - at Trewey Common, Zennor, at the end of October - was well received, as were two different HERMIT THRUSHES on the Outer Hebrides, a first-winter female NORTHERN PARULA on Tiree (Argyll) and 2-3 MYRTLE WARBLERS in western Ireland.

About Me

I have been birding since 1969 but became obsessed with 'twitching' in 1974 and haven't looked back since. Have driven over 1.3 million miles in pursuit of rare birds in the UK, where to date I have recorded 588 species in Britain and Ireland. I also have a fascination for the Birds of the Western Palearctic, where I have currently recorded 880 of the 1,064 species ever recorded. I am widely travelled in North America, as well as in Africa and Asia, and have written at least 29 books on my chosen subject, including best-sellers ''Ultimate Site Guide to Scarcer British Birds' and 'Rare Birds in Britain 1800-1990'. Established the UK400 Club in 1981 to cater for the most obsessive of the British birding fraternity and now concentrate on online publishing, via the www.uk400clubonline.co.uk website. Record Birding achievements include recording 386 species in Britain & Ireland in 1996 and 627+ in the Western Palearctic in 2008